Developments have been made in forming and packaging multistrand roving of glass fibers or filaments wherein fibers or filaments have been separated into strands by a comb-like guide or shoe and the separated strands engaged with a secondary comb-like guide or shoe to divert the strands through substantially ninety degrees and the strands converged into a roving and wound into a package. In such installation in which a spiral wire traverse member of the character shown in the U.S. Patent to Beach No. 2,391,870 is utilized in traversing the roving as it is wound into a package, several difficulties are encountered where the secondary guide or shoe is maintained in a relatively fixed position with respect to the winding collet and the traverse mechanism.
With a relatively fixed comb-like guide for the separated or split strands there is a reduction in the splitting efficiency which causes several problems. With a relatively stationary secondary guide or shoe the degree of the included angle of the fan-shaped group of strands approaching the spiral wire traverse member is very narrow. As the package increases in size, the degree of the angle of the group of strands does not change and the strands tend to pile up at the traverse member. This factor increases with the size of the package thereby restricting the size of the package that can be wound on a winding machine.
The product or roving on the inside region of the package may be over split and usually causes roving runability degration. The roving or product at the outer region of the package is usually under split and the coarse bundles impair the laminate appearance of the roving and the strength of the roving. In further processing the roving, there is usually a high level of fines from "slivers" off the course bundles which causes conformance problems in molding plastic materials wherein the roving is used as reinforcement in the plastic materials.